Warren man accused of exposing, fondling himself in front of woman in downtown Royal Oak

ROYAL OAK -- A Warren man who is a registered sex offender is charged with exposing and fondling himself in front of a woman in the city's downtown as she was walking to work.

Joseph Butkovich, 19, was jailed on $50,000 cash bond set at his arraignment Tuesday before Royal Oak 44th District Judge Terrence Brennan.

Butkovich is charged with indecent exposure by a sexually delinquent person because of three previous convictions for indecent exposure in Macomb County Circuit Court, police said.

He also has a previous indecent exposure conviction in Roseville 39th District Court.

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The current charge against the suspect is punishable by from one day to life imprisonment.

Royal Oak police said they stopped Butkovich about 7:50 a.m. Sunday when he was spotted running down the street and acting suspicious in the area of Sixth and Lafayette streets.

"He was running and looking over his shoulder," said Royal Oak Police Sgt. William Sawyer. "He was stopped right as he got to his car, a black Cadillac CTS."

Police in the area located the woman Butkovich is accused of exposing himself to while the suspect was detained.

The suspect is accused of exposing his private parts to the woman and fondling himself after he dashed out from the side of an apartment building.

Butkovich also faces a misdemeanor charge of being a minor in possession of alcohol.

He is scheduled for a pre-exam hearing in Royal Oak District Court at 9 a.m. Friday.

In an unrelated case, Royal Oak police also are looking for a man who exposed himself Jan. 4 to a woman as he sat in his car outside the CVS drugstore at 30900 Woodward Ave.

The woman told police she had just parked in a handicap parking space when the man backed his white Honda Civic into the space next to her. She told police the man, about 25 years old, exposed himself as she was getting out of her car.